Nabaztag/tag users up in arms about spotty service, missing features
By Paul Miller 
posted Feb 7th 2007 11:16AM
posted Feb 7th 2007 11:16AM
While we typically question the sanity of anyone who would pay $200+ for a talking rabbit (not really, we're just jealous), it looks like Nabaztag/tag fanboys/girls have a reason to be upset. Out of the box, many buyers of the cute little bunny found that they had just purchased a cute little paperweight, since Violet's API was down for days at a time. Now that those server problems have been fixed and the Nabaztag/tag can actually receive info from the service, buyers are finding that Violet expects an extra fee for some services, and completely failed to include other features in the box, such as RFID tags compatible with the bunny. Other features are hopelessly bad in their execution, such as instances of asking tag/tag for the weather, and receiving a response three minutes later. Hardly the virtual pet nirvana most users were hoping for. Violet has indicated that it has heard the complaints of its customers, but still hasn't issued a formal response to address the issues. We'll keep an eye out for such a word, and until that day we'll put our hope in Violet-alternatives such as OpenNab, which promise to help "Unleash Your Inner Bunny" without all the hassle of tangling with the company that gave it birth.[Thanks, Mark B]
I was quite literally about to order one of these. Thanks for saving me the regret.
too bad it sounds pretty cool.
...just to get this out of the way...
I for one welcome our robotic bunny overlords ;P
possibly the biggest crisis of our generation!
We have a tag/tag and although it's not all that was promised (missing features and sketchy service), I believe they will get it together.
But I must say, if you were willing to splash out on a white plastic talking illuminated rabbit that "sniffs" RFID, you were not thinking "this will complete my home computing needs - my work is done" you were thinking "cool" a rabbit that talks - last time that happened was one of those parties a college.
I bought the nabaztag/tag with the hopes that I could say "weather" and hear the temperature or "schedule" and hear my list of meetings for the day. I've been dreaming about a device that could do this for as long as I can remember.
So when I saw the tag/tag in the store with its voice recognition, streaming audio, RSS reader and API all in a cute bunny I thought my prayers had been answered. Now I'm not an early adopter and the price was about $180 but it promised the exact thing I wanted - to know what my day had in store before I even got out of bed.
I couldn't wait to set it up. That is until I had to deal with their service. Of the hundreds of possibilities listed on the box only a handful were free. And even then you only get 15 messages a month without paying (there are at least 20 days each month that I would like to know the weather). I tested the weather feature because it was free. As a result of the service problems I could only get the current temperature 3 minutes later in celcius. Which is not exactly what I was expecting. The site had been converted to english but with their problems the english version of the service did not seem to be a priority.
If I wanted to use voice recognition or to get my schedule via RSS I needed to upgrade to the $7/month service. I would've done that but the site said that I already was a full bunny until Feb 14th. So in theory I should've been able to use my fancy faetures but alas the full bunny services were down.
So I would hold off until the 3rd generation before buying a rabbit.
I got a tag/tag for Christmas, and while there have been some problems, I guess I wasn't planning on using all that many of their built in features anyway :) I'm still very happy with it... almost got it working as a server status notifier and will be putting up a web messenger on http://www.stephthegeek.tv
I got the original incarnation of the Nabaztag; the one without the /tag on the end. I like it a lot, it does exactly what's promised if you actually read the information before buying (which you should do before you buy anything that costs >$150). There are only a few free services, but the pay service only costs about $3 a month anyway. Here's my advice: If you want one and can afford it, then go for it, but if you don't understand the appeal, it was never designed for you in the first place, so don't worry about it.